More than 91 percent of Laclede’s earnings will come from rate-regulated business after the acquisition of Missouri Gas Energy and New England Gas Co, owned by Energy Transfer’s affiliate, Southern Union Co.

About 68 percent of Laclede’s operating revenue of $1.12 billion came from its regulated gas distribution business in the year ended September 30.

“With lower ... prices, more and more customers are interested in using natural gas,” Chief Executive Suzanne Sitherwood told Reuters. “The other emerging market that is taking place is with natural gas vehicles.”

Gas prices have fallen sharply from their peak of more than $13 per million metric British thermal unit (mmBtu) to about $3 now due to vast supplies from shale fields in North America.

This has prompted increased use of gas for heating and power generation. Westport Innovations Inc WPT.TO, General Motors Co (GM.N), Caterpillar Inc (CAT.N) and Ford Motor Co (F.N) are some of the companies developing technologies to drive the use of the fuel in vehicles.

Laclede too has been working on fueling natural gas vehicles and has received a lot of interest for possible partnerships, Sitherwood said. She did not name the interested parties.

GOOD PRICE FOR ETE

Missouri Gas and New England Gas, which had combined revenue of about $517 million for the year ended September 30, serve more than 500,000 customers in western Missouri and about 50,000 in Massachusetts.

The acquisition, which includes debt of about $20 million, will take Laclede’s customer base to 1.2 million, the company said in a statement.

Laclede expects the acquisition to be neutral to its earnings per share in the first full year after close, likely in the third quarter of 2013.

Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP.N), a unit of Energy Transfer Equity and a party to the deal, said the transaction was part of the company’s efforts to divest non-core assets.